Reply #2: Thank you! [View All]

If you don't mind, I am going to re-post some of my previous messages here.

Partly because I tend to fall in love with my own words.

But mostly because I think it is important.

1) The public education system has thoroughly failed to provide most
Americans with a solid grounding in science.

2) The media feeds us a constant diet of "crap science." Every day the TV is
full of shows about psychic detectives, alien abduction, the lost city of
Atlantis, and other such nonsense. All too often, this is presented as a
"documentary."

3) Go to a book store and look at the "science" section. It is often limited
to one shelf OR LESS. Mixed in with the science books, you'll often find such
subjects as crystal power, psychic ability, the lost city of Atlantis, and
other non-science nonsense that belong in the New Age section, and not in the
Science section. I have made a habit of re-locating these books within the
stores myself.

Is it any wonder that so many people are confused about what is science and
what is New Age Crystal Clutching Nonsense?

Read the introduction to "The Demon Haunted World," by Carl Sagan. He
recounts a conversation he had with a New York taxi driver.

These people spend a great deal of time studying and reading what they HAVE
BEEN FOOLED INTO THINKING IS SCIENCE!

They are not necessarily STUPID. They have been TRICKED.

They have invested a great deal of time and energy in this garbage that they
have been fed. It is very difficult to make someone come to grips with the fact
that they have invested a great deal of time and energy in something that is
wrong.

On the other hand, they could actually be freepers come here to make us look
bad so The New York Times can say, "The other message boards are making fun of
DemocraticUnderground.com for saying the oil companies caused the tsunami and
that HAARP will turn the oceans into chocolate milk."

------------

File this under: Why do I bother?
----

There are people who love Alternative Medicine with all their hearts, because it
isn't regulated by the "oppressive" FDA that wants to "suppress" all the
wonderful stuff that people who usually died by the age of 35 came up with
2,000 years ago.

Those same people decry the Republicans for wanting to de-regulate everything
ELSE about our safety.

And many of those same people will scream from the highest hill that Nutrasweet
is poison, because Orin Hatch snuck it past the FDA.

And this is the SAME Orin Hatch that was the architect of the 1994 act that
exempted alternative medicine as a "nutritional supplement" from being
scrutinized by the FDA.

So, the thinking goes:

When the FDA is not allowed to scrutinize alternative medicine, this is GOOD --
even though it was Orin Hatch's idea.

When the FDA is not allowed to scrutinize Nutrasweet, this is BAD-- especially
since it was Orin Hatch's idea.

We scream from the highest hill that the mainstream media is lying to us, they
are deceiving us, and they are un-trustworthy. We say the media has failed to
educate the public about Bush, the war in Iraq, and election fraud.

Yet some of us trust that same mainstream media to "educate" us about "science."

Well, this may be news to some, but The Discovery Channel, A&E, The History
Channel, The Sci-fi Channel, Geraldo Rivera, Johnathan Frakes, Bryant Gumbel,
and the broadcast networks-- They are all to science what FOX News is to
politics.

Evaluating scientific claims on the basis of what you have seen on TV is like
going to a voting booth based on what Bill O'Reilly tells you.

If you have been fed bad information from TV, you are more likely to seek
confirmatory evidence from books and internet sources. Once you're put on the
wrong path, you tend to stay on that wrong path.

When Geraldo Rivera tells you about UFOs at Area 51, you run out and buy books
about "UFO Conspiracies" and become "educated" about it, and begin to believe
you are "learning science." You start thinking about what you have read in
books, heard on Art Bell, and seen on the internet, and eventually forget it
was Geraldo where you first learned that this was "science" in the first place.

Why is it so hard for people who know they have been lied to about something
important to realize they have been lied to about something ELSE that is
important?

Why do you think we need to push so hard to keep Evolution in schools, and
Creationism out of them? It's because when people are lied to, they will reach
the wrong conclusions.

The media lies about politics. The media lies about science, and call it
"infotainment."

It is not that these people here are stupid.

Incredibly stubborn, yes. But not necessarily stupid.

The problem is THEY HAVE BEEN LIED TO.

I will say again:

The mainstream media lies about politics.

The mainstream media lies about science.

Those two statements are easy to reconcile.

You have been lied to.

------

More info:

Covering Science: Why the Media So Seldom Get It Right (Skeptical Briefs June
1995) (750)
http://www.csicop.org/sb/9506/media.html

When the Media Tell Half the Story; Media Watch (Skeptical Inquirer May 1997)
(1000)
http://www.csicop.org/si/9705/media-watch.html

Science and Reason in Film and Television (Skeptical Inquirer January 1996)
(125)
http://www.csicop.org/si/9601/media.html

Science and the Media (CSICOP Web Column) (375)
http://www.csicop.org/scienceandmedia/index.html

Conspiracy Theories and Paranoia: Notes from a Mind-Control Conference
(Skeptical Inquirer September 1996) (125)
http://www.csicop.org/si/9609/conspiracy.html

Art Bell, Heaven's Gate, and Journalistic Integrity (Skeptical Inquirer July
1997) (125)
http://www.csicop.org/si/9707/art-bell.html

Battle Between Political Agendas and Science (Skeptical Inquirer November 1997)
(125)
http://www.csicop.org/si/9711/conference.html

2002: The Year of the Conspiracy Crank (Skeptical Briefs December 2002) (83)
http://www.csicop.org/sb/2002-12/conspiracy.html

CSICOP / News / The Phantom Menace of Superstition in Film and Television (8)
http://www.csicop.org/articles/19990527-starwars/index.html


`Independent UFO Investigation' and Media Gullibility (Skeptical Inquirer
September 1998) (750)
http://www.csicop.org/si/9809/sheaffer.html


Why Is Pseudoscience Dangerous? (Skeptical Inquirer July 2002) (125)
http://www.csicop.org/si/2002-07/dangerous.html

Development of Beliefs in Paranormal and Supernatural Phenomena (Skeptical
Inquirer Mar 2004) (125)
http://www.csicop.org/si/2004-03/belief.html